Standard C&C Disclaimer:  All the below is my only occasionally useful
humble opinion, my only occasionally correct grammatical and spelling
corrections, and/or my only occasionlly funny humor.

On Wed, 06 Aug 2003 02:12:42 -0700 Mark Shurtleff <gaijin@sfcmd.com>
writes:

Michi loved the countryside, loved everything about it, so learning 
a miko's
duties and helping out with the chores at the Ishiyama shrine was a 
very small
price to pay indeed.

I imagine most people reading this fic will know what a miko is, but it
might be a decent idea to somehow work in a definition for those who
don't.

The 
picturesque
railway up the mountainside to Chichibu-tama National Park and the 
numerous 
golf
courses dotting the area were popular attractions, and the 
increasing 
hordes of
amateur athletes kayaking the rapids on the Tama created interesting 
traffic
jams all of their own.

Maybe "all on their own"?  Not sure.

Fortunately, it would be a long time before the development began to 
encroach on
the mountainous and heavily forested northern hillside where the 
shrine was
situated. A long time before the hustle and bustle of the city could 
reach out
to disturb the serenity of the countryside Michi so adored. 

I believe this second sentence is actually a fragment.

Happosai continued on as if he hadn't even heard Ranma's response. 
"This is 
the
silk underwear of the immortal Kikusha herself.

....well, I suppose thats to be expected with Happi.

To be able to throw ki balls as an attack took a level of training 
so high 
as to
be almost unbelievable. Chikako's sorcery was guided by her own 
spiritual
strength, but it was fueled by the kami. She knew first hand just 
how 
difficult
it was to actually project one's own life force in such a manner 
without the
assistance of the spirit world.

You know, though it's fairly standard for outsiders to make that kind of
comment on ki attacks in Ranma fanfic, I wonder at its appropriateness. 
There certainly doesn't seem to be any shortage of people able to perform
them in the Ranmaverse... and even a number of others Ranma's age (Ryouga
and Ryu Kumon come to mind).

In a similar vein, earlier Chikako makes a comment along the lines that
she wouldn't have expected to see something like the battle between Ranma
and Happi outside of a movie.  While that might be appropriate for a
"normal" person, or maybe even Michi, but given Chikako's own
supernatural abilities and later evident fammiliartirty with anime-style
devil hunters, I find it odd that she would find such a battle too
unusual, or even that she would not have previous experience with
Nerima-level martial artists.

Anyways, just a thought or two.

--------------------
END CHAPTER

Hrm... well, I liked it.  There's potential here, but at the moment
that's all it is.  I can't really say much more until I've seen how well
the next chapter or two holds my interest.

I'll certainly keep an eye out for those chapters, though ;)

And, since I don't believe I ever C&Ced Relatively Absent (though I meant
to), I'll take this moment to note that I'm reading and enjoying that
fic, and am looking forward to seeing more of it.

           Aaron Nowack
"Never let reality get in the way of a good hypothesis."
http://www.geocities.com/anowack/

________________________________________________________________
The best thing to hit the internet in years - Juno SpeedBand!
Surf the web up to FIVE TIMES FASTER!
Only $14.95/ month - visit www.juno.com to sign up today!

             .---Anime/Manga Fanfiction Mailing List----.
             | Administrators - ffml-admins@anifics.com |
             | Unsubscribing - ffml-request@anifics.com |
             |     Put 'unsubscribe' in the subject     |
             `---- http://ffml.anifics.com/faq.txt -----'